English Language Learning Through Caribbean Literature? Why is
it a doubly challenging proposal?
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The Breaking of a Twofold Taboo: The mix of Language &
Literature The mix of Language & Postcolonial Literature
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Better to stay with the reassuring English Language Course
book: at any cost? Two examples: Headways Advanced (2008) The
Handbook of World English (2006)
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Example1: Dear Mr Winchester, I just want you to know that
meeting you that day was one of the most extraordinary events of my
life. [] Nothing happens here. There is no one here who speaks
English. Occasionally there is some sort of migrant worker but one
day I met this man who not only can speak English, but is English
and, my passion is Trollope. I was able to speak about Trollope. He
knew all about Trollope and it was like you were like an angel from
heaven.
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Caribbean Iconic reminder M IRANDA Abhorred slave, I took pains
to make thee speak CALIBAN you taught me language; and my profit
ont is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you for learning me
your language
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Iconic reminder Friday began to talk pretty well, and
understand the names of almost everything I called for and of every
place I had to send him to.
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Example 2 They thought they were exploring or transporting
breadfruit to the profit of slave- owners. The British Empire is
now gone; the breadfruit tree never became profitable crop. What
remains is a way of speaking, a mouth to many people who would not
be able to express themselves if not for English, one natural means
by which gifted writers express themselves in countries under
British rule. And when they write, they doubtless do not stop to
reflect on how it came about that it is English their instrument of
choice.
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Walcott on Trollopes language The tone of judgement in the
travel journal of Trollope. These travellers carried with them the
infection of their own malaise, and their prose reduced even the
landscape to melancholia and self-contempt. The Antillean
archipelago was there to be written about, not to write itself, by
Trollope, in the tone of a compassionate outsider, distancing
himself from the place even while enjoying it.
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Walcott on the breadfruit tree From this thick tree issues
miraculous bread. The breadfruit makes itself from copious shade, a
voluble, invaluable dome, a library, where all the towns talk is
stored, and in whose core is coiled a tempest, a rising sea in
wind, the spinning pages of remorseful texts, Blighs logs and
cannonballs
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Breadfruit trees
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Our general assumptions about ELT? E is best thaught
monolingually The ideal teacher is a native speaker The earlier E
is taught, the better the results The more E is taught the better
the results If other LS are used much, standards of English will
drop. (R. Phillipson Linguistic Imperialism, 1992)
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So how to proceed? by knowing the history of our assumptions
about English and ELT by seeing that a submerged history and
paradigm do exist, as exemplified by Caribbean culture and
experience.
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The history of our assumptions about English and ELT in 2
points: Europes Monolingual Orientation & The ethnicity of the
English Language
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B asic ideas : L=community=place 1L=1 identity L as a
self-standing system Ls as pure and separated The locus of L is the
mind (cognition) rather than social context Communication is based
on grammar rather than practice
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Key intellectual movements Romanticism: the L-C-P triad The
Enlightenment: the mind as site of L Structuralism: L as
self-standing system Colonialism & Imperialism: superiority of
European LS
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Romanticism & the L-C-P triad: L defines the essence and
values of a C each L is stamped with the values of a C and a P: L
gets territorialized L and P make a C pure and homogenous; no other
L can express them better; the L-C-P triad causes Ps to be
colonised for one L; the invention of standards causes Ls to become
fixed codes; L overlaps with ones identity>the NS as natural
authority.
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Structuralism : L is a self-standing system > L are
permanent, closed and isolated from other semiotic systems; L is
isolated from social life and uses; L is transparent and neutral,
detached from any political discourse.
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Colonialism &Imperialism C&I take off from these above
discourses: the European nations full of pride in their superiority
and in the ways in which their Ls serve a scientific and
technological progress, feel legitimated to to impose their Ls on
other communities.
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The ethnicity of English From the second half of the 19 th
century the British develop a different version of the triad L-C-P:
E becomes a WL, the British a mixed cosmopolitan race and their
nation transnational, as wide as the empire
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The rise of the mixed race Those who pride themselves on the
racial purity and invincible character of the conventional Briton,
will receive a shock on becoming acquainted with the history of
England. The British islands have been invaded and conquered so
frequently, that their present inhabitants must be considered as
either the most mongrels of races or a mlange [] Who are we
English? [] Are we an amalgamation or are all these types found
pure on our soil?
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The Saxons become Anglo-Saxons: The previous idea of the Saxon
ethnicity had excluded the British of Celtic origins ; the need to
include the British scattered all over the empire ; the empire at
ho me: migration to and from the colonies was visible
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Consequences: Ideological: the British C was re-conceived as
mixed, open-up to include a whole range of ethnicities whose id
stretched beyond national borders; the British became a globalised
race; Concrete: 1) the L-C-P triad is globalised; 2) a deep sense
of belonging kept it together; 3) Greater Britain was divided into
settlement colonies (home abroad) and dependencies (alien
possessions, such as India or the WI).
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The emerging history and paradigm of EL & why it applies to
the Caribbean English experience
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Two key-principles : Communication involves more than one
language Communication involves several semiotic systems
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How do these key principles apply to the Caribbean? Caribbean
English is originally trans-lingual Caribbean English is based on
the music and motions of Creole
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The Making of Creolised English through Creole knowledge &
Memories
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The Epic of the Middle Passage
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The mixing-up of African languages, new and old pigeons
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Sugarcane field culture: folktales and work songs
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Canefield culture
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Work songs handed down through the local music made of African
and European rhythms
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The type of English emerging from the Caribbean: two examples
VS Naipaul Lorna Goodison